The 11 Best Grocery Delivery and Alcohol Delivery Services

The dilemma—you need food or drinks, but you don’t want to leave home to make it happen. These grocery, alcohol, and takeout delivery services are here to save the day.

Editor’s Note: With the current COVID-19 pandemic, it’s more important than ever to limit physical interactions. Most of the sites listed below now offer “no-contact” delivery options, where you can request that your driver leave your delivery outside your door. (You’ll be notified when your food is out there, so it’s not left sitting.) Payments and tips are done within the site/app, so there’s no need to exchange cash. Remember during this difficult time to recognize the vulnerability of delivery people and tip generously.

Best Grocery Delivery Services

Amazon Fresh

If you’re an Amazon Prime member in an eligible region, you can get your groceries delivered for free (assuming you meet the order minimum) through Amazon Fresh. You can order a wide selection of groceries, including meat, seafood, produce, snacks, and household essentials, as well as selected best-selling Amazon items, and have them delivered to your door within hours.

Don’t want to wait around for your delivery? Amazon Fresh offers both attended and unattended delivery options. Be sure to browse the Fresh Deals section before ordering, where you’ll find lots of great savings.

Note that you’ll need to be an Amazon Prime member (free trial members are eligible as well) to shop Amazon Fresh. You can also shop Amazon Fresh for free if you have a SNAP EBT card—here are more details on how to use the benefit.

Walmart Grocery

Walmart is a great place to find rock-bottom prices on groceries, but it’s also a surprisingly good place to buy fresh produce and other perishables. Walmart Grocery allows you to place your order online and have your goods delivered to your door within a time slot that you choose. A delivery fee applies and varies based on the time slot that you book.

Avoid the fee by signing up for Delivery Unlimited, a membership that costs $12.95 monthly or $98 annually, and waives the delivery fee for any time slot. Sign up for a free trial of Delivery Unlimited here.

Shipt

Need groceries and to run some errands? Shipt does it all for you, sending someone to do your shopping at places like Costco, CVS, Meijer, Petco, Target, and more—and you can get delivery as quickly as in an hour.

Forgot to add something to your list? The Shipt app allows you to add on an item as long as shopping is still in progress. In select cities, you can even order alcohol along with your groceries.

For $8.25 a month, you get unlimited same-day delivery, with no delivery fees for orders over $35.

Fresh Direct

Fresh Direct’s goal is to shorten the supply chain, cutting out the grocery store middleman and bringing you food faster and cheaper. You can order everything from prepared foods (including pre-made four-minute meals) to fresh meat and fish and even beer, wine, and spirits.

Order minimums and delivery fees vary depending on location, but you can bypass both with a DeliveryPass membership. Sign up here for a 60-Day free Delivery Pass trial, which will get you unlimited free deliveries, special offers, and more.

Instacart

Get groceries in an hour with Instacart’s ultra-fast delivery service. The site connects you to a personal shopper who will go out and shop for everything you need, and deliver it all to your door. Planning ahead? You can schedule your delivery for later in the day or the week.

Instacart delivers from a huge variety of stores, including Total Wine, HMart, Aldi, Wegmans, and more.

The delivery fee varies depending on your order cost and time, or you can sign up for an Instacart Express membership for $99 a year, which will give you unlimited free deliveries on all orders over $35.

Postmates

Postmates does it all—this service delivers groceries, takeout, and alcohol—all in under an hour. So, as the site’s tagline boasts, they can get you a gallon of milk or a handle of vodka—or both.

Delivery fees vary, but for $9.99 a month, you can get Postmates Unlimited membership, which gives you free delivery on every order over $12, access to Postmate Events, no surcharges for peak hours orders, and special offers. Click here for a free trial.

Best Alcohol Delivery Services

Drizly

Need a drink now? Drizly delivers beer, wine, and liquor directly to you in 60 minutes or less.

Drizly partners with local stores, so you may find your favorite wine store on the app (possibly even offering free delivery). Otherwise, a $5 delivery fee usually applies.

Saucey

Need a drink even faster than that? Saucey offers on-demand 30-minute delivery, or two-day shipping if you’re not in that big of a rush. Open from 8 am to 2 am daily (in most markets) Saucey will bring you beer, wine, spirits, and mixers.

Best of all: there are no delivery fees or order minimums.

Best Takeout Delivery Services

DoorDash

With over 300,000 restaurants available across the U.S. and Canada, DoorDash is likely to have whatever you’re craving.

Order fees vary by restaurant, or you can sign up for a DashPass a $9.99 monthly subscription that offers a $0 delivery fee and reduced service fees for orders over $12 from eligible restaurants.

Seamless/Grubhub

Order from your favorite local restaurant via Seamless or Grubhub, which have merged into the same company. Delivery and service fees vary by restaurant. Make sure to download the Grubhub/Seamless app or check Seamless’ promotions page or Grubhub’s deal page to find deals, coupons, and promos before you order. 

Caviar

Never tried Caviar’s delivery service before? Sign up now and you’ll score $0 delivery fees for a whole month. Otherwise, delivery fees vary based on distance.

Caviar has a huge range of local restaurants available, and offers quick delivery.

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Caroline Morse Teel is a Principal Editor for SmarterTravel. Follow her on Instagram @travelwithcaroline for travel photos and advice.